Stairway to Heaven
by vericus
Summary: There are bad times for things to happen, and then there are the times only Jazz could manage to pick. SLASH.
1. Chapter 1

**Summary:** There are bad times for things to happen, and then there are the times only Jazz could manage to pick.

**Pairing/Characters:** Prowl/Jazz, Sideswipe, Sunstreaker, Bluestreak, Ratchet, Hound/Mirage

**Rating:** T

**Disclaimer:** Not mine.

**Author's Note:** This fic, and my other updates tonight, have all been up on my writing LJ for awhile, but I finally decided to update them here. Story title has nothing to do with the song. Kinda. Not really. Maybe?

**- Stairway to Heaven : Chapter One -**

"Welcome back, Prowl." was the first thing that greeted Prowl on his return to consciousness, and he groaned. Like the other residents of the Ark, Prowl had learned to be wary of Ratchet greeting him with a 'welcome back'. It was never a good sign, because it usually meant he'd 'fragged himself good and proper' and Ratchet had just spent the last day putting his 'sorry chassis' back together.

"How bad?" Prowl asked, then answered his own question when he attempted to boot up his optics and got back an error message.

"That bad." Ratchet said, obviously knowing what Prowl had just tried. "The explosion damaged the receivers in your optics badly."

"Oh." Prowl said.

"Yes, 'oh' is right. I can't replace your optics without replacing your visual center, which is a tricky procedure. Fortunately, your optics should repair themselves within a week or two." Ratchet said. "_Only_ if they're not used, however. And since I have yet to have a patient with this type of injury that's actually not used their optics, even knowing that irreversible damage to their optics and replacement of their visual center is at stake, I've opted to forgo telling you to be good and not use your optics for the next two weeks."

"And just deactivated them?" Prowl asked with some amusement.

"No. Tempting, but no. You'd find a way to override it, anyways." Ratchet said, sounding just as amused. "I've rerouted your sensors into your optical center. If you boot them up, your imaging software should create a rough image of the room around you, probably in infrared." Prowl did so and was unsurprised to find that Ratchet was right.

"Interesting." he said as he looked around the isolation room with infrared vision, able for the first time since the Ark was being built to see where the pipes and electrical lines were behind the walls.

"Yes, well, it's not perfect. Any electromagnetic interference or sensor blocking device will render you blind, and the only way you'll be able to read is via direct link with a data pad or terminal." Ratchet said.

"So stay away from the labs and keep my office locked when doing paperwork." Prowl guessed, and watched with fascination as the infrared-Ratchet nodded.

"Exactly. And, needless to say, you're off battle-duty and confined to the Ark." Ratchet said. "I've informed Prime, as well as Wheeljack and First Aid, of your condition, but I thought it best not to let the rest of the Ark know. The _last_ thing I want to deal with is the twins when they find out you can't see normally."

"Indeed. I think we would _all_ dread that." Prowl said with dry amusement.

"Hmph. Yes." Ratchet said. "I want to do a few tests to make sure there's no undue stress on your visual center, and then if you're up to it, you can go."

"Alright." Prowl said.

"Get up, then." Ratchet said, stepping back. Prowl spent the next hour going through various tests of his visual perception before Ratchet was satisfied. "You may experience some stress in the visual center - if that happens, just reboot your sensors. The time they take to reboot should be enough to allow the visual center to calm down. Hopefully, however, _regular_ recharge should prevent that from happening." the pointed comment was not lost on Prowl.

"I will endeavor to keep regular office hours." Prowl promised, and Ratchet nodded.

"Good. Now get out." Ratchet said, pointing to the door.

"Thank you for your excellent services, Ratchet." Prowl said agreeably, then left as instructed, heading out through the empty med bay to the 'waiting room' beyond. He was disconcerted to find that, though he could see a mech sitting there, and suspected from past experience that it was Jazz, he couldn't actually confirm it. His crippled 'vision' wasn't detailed enough for him to make out more than a general shape and size, and there were quite a few mechs of the same general shape and size as Jazz around the Ark. Fortunately, he didn't have to wonder who it was for long, as the mech jumped up when he exited the med bay.

"Prowler! Ratch' finally let you out, huh?" it was certainly Jazz, and Prowl wasn't sure if it was more disconcerting not having known who it was or not being able to see Jazz's expression.

"Indeed he did." Prowl said as Jazz fell into step beside him as he headed out of the waiting room.

"I suppose he told you that you're off battle-duty for the next two weeks?" Jazz asked, and Prowl nodded.

"He did." Prowl said. "And he informed me that if he found out I did any work today, I would be off duty, period, for the next month."

"Heh, yeah. I got it covered, anyways." Jazz replied. "Might wanna use the spare time t'check on Blue. He's been mopin' around since the battle." Prowl sighed.

"When will he learn that it is _not_ his fault if I end up injured?" the tactician asked somewhat rhetorically.

"Probably about the time he stops caring about you." Jazz said with a chuckle. "Which will probably happen long before you give in and admit you've been adopted as his surrogate creator."

"Mentor, if anything." Prowl replied with fake grumpiness. Bluestreak's opinion of Prowl was a long-standing debate between Prowl and Jazz, which both of them found far too entertaining to spoil by actually going and asking the mech in question to settle it.

"You have an adopted sparkling, whether you want one or not. Give in and accept it!" Jazz said with a laugh, then unexpectedly bumped his shoulder into Prowl's, causing the tactician to stagger slightly. "Whoa!" Jazz said, grabbing Prowl's shoulder to help steady him. "You alright there?"

"Fine, just a little...disoriented still." Prowl said, frowning. It was strangely difficult to predict the other mech's movements, even though he could literally see Jazz's internals working.

"You sure?" Jazz asked.

"Yes. We're almost at my quarters, anyways. I can lay down and recharge, allow my systems time to defrag before tomorrow." Prowl replied reassuringly, and Jazz nodded, though the rest of the walk was spent in silence, during which the saboteur watched Prowl closely, probably looking for any signs that he needed to take Prowl back to Ratchet. Which was another sign of just how slagged he'd gotten himself, if Jazz was this worried about him. Prowl made a mental note to try looking away from the explosion next time, and save himself the worried Ratchet and Jazz experience.

Fortunately, Jazz didn't seem to find anything overly worrying, as he left Prowl in peace once the tactician reached his quarters, and with great relief, Prowl shut the door and began a careful inspection of his quarters. Unexpected things looked different using just his sensors, and he wanted to catalog the differences so that he wouldn't make a mistake later. He ended up glad he did, as he had just settled down to relax for a bit before going to find Bluestreak when the mech himself showed up at Prowl's door...along with the twins.

Bluestreak was, as Jazz had said, overly mopey about the whole ordeal, and Prowl spent the entire time Bluestreak was there trying to convince the gunner that it wasn't his fault. Even with the twins' help, though, Prowl was fairly sure he still didn't get through. In the end, it was partially a need to recharge and partially exasperation with Bluestreak's stubborn refusal to give up his guilt that caused Prowl to shoo them all out of his quarters.

"Y'know, Blue hasn't been the only one acting mopey since the battle." Sunstreaker said on his way out, Bluestreak and Sideswipe already halfway down the hall, still bickering about how Prowl's injuries weren't the gunner's fault.

"Jazz is always depressed when I'm injured. He hates my paperwork." Prowl said dryly.

"I know Jazz's 'I hate paperwork' mope. This wasn't it." Sunstreaker said seriously.

"Sunstreaker -" Prowl said with annoyance.

"Hey, I said I wouldn't say anything to him. I never said I wouldn't try and convince _you_ to do something about it." Sunstreaker said, chuckling slightly, then ducked out the doorway, transforming briefly to catch up with his brother and Bluestreak. Prowl shook his head and palmed the door closed, wondering not for the first time what had possessed him during that battle in the ruins of Polyhex, even if he was certain they were both going to die, to confide anything to Sunstreaker. Granted, Sunstreaker had said some things he wouldn't have normally, too, and they had both agreed not to mention it to anyone...but Prowl's feelings about a certain saboteur were something the golden mech couldn't seem to let lie.

Prowl shook his head and dismissed the whole thing as he lay down on his berth - Sunstreaker's word was as good as Optimus', despite what some mechs might think. The golden mech wouldn't say anything to Jazz, so as long as Prowl could handle Sunstreaker's pointed comments and remarks, everything was fine. Except for his vision, Prowl amended with a grimace. His head ached from the unusual input, and after a moment's thought, he got up again and locked his quarters with his command code before getting back in the berth and shutting off his sensors for recharge. It was oddly disconcerting to have them all the way off, but the ache in his head immediately eased, and Prowl drifted off into recharge peacefully a short time later.

* * *

"It's aching every day?" Ratchet asked, a frown audible in his voice.

"By midday I can barely think. I've taken to having a short recharge on my lunch break." Prowl confirmed, wincing slightly as speaking caused the ache to increase. It had been several days since Prowl had been released from the med bay, and while having his sensors tied into his visual center was still working, it was hurting far more than Ratchet had implied it would, so Prowl had decided to visit the infirmary.

"Hmm. It isn't supposed to be anywhere near that bad." Ratchet said, picking up several diagnostic tools and running them over Prowl's head.

"Maybe it has something to do with his battle simulator?" Wheeljack offered from the other side of the med bay, where he was apparently building some basic joints for use in repairs.

"I've had my simulator off." Prowl replied. "I suspected it might cause difficulties, and the other tacticians need to stretch their abilities anyways."

"You may have it off, but I'm reading data going into it." Ratchet put in from above Prowl. "Hmm. I'm going to have to pull up your specifications and have a look, Prowl. In the mean time, feel free to dial down your sensors and give your visual center a rest. Wheeljack and I can warn you if anyone comes in."

"Thank you, Ratchet." Prowl said with relief, turning down his sensors to a minimum.

"Someday, I will find whoever designed your cranium, and I will give them a piece of mine." Ratchet said somewhat grumpily, giving Prowl a pat on the shoulder, then stepped away, leaving Prowl alone on the med bay berth. Prowl didn't really mind - he'd always found med bay relaxing in-between battles. Which, really, was exactly what Ratchet wanted - he'd kick out those that came in to annoy or bother him or his patients, but those that just needed some peace and quiet, he'd let stay. It was the obvious soft inside to his grumpy medic exterior.

Prowl had drifted into a light recharge when the doors opened, startling him back to consciousness. He tensed, prepared to dial up his sensors again, but Wheeljack spoke up almost immediately.

"Hi Jazz. What can we do for ya?" the inventor asked casually.

"Hey Wheeljack, Ratchet - Prowl?" Jazz added the last part curiously.

"Just a follow-up on his repairs after the battle." Ratchet interceded neatly. "Optics are tricky parts to repair. Especially when one looks directly into a high-intensity explosion and melts half of them."

"Shall I ask Skywarp to wait for me to turn my head the next time?" Prowl asked with all due politeness.

"Oh mute it." Ratchet said with a snort.

"And Prowl's stealthy humour strikes again." Jazz said with a chuckle.

"It's hardly stealthy." Prowl replied.

"You rarely let it out, so we never see it coming. Therefore, it's stealthy." Jazz countered.

"Was there something you needed, Jazz, or were you just looking for some friendly banter?" Ratchet interjected.

"I'm always lookin' for some friendly banter, Ratch. But no, my shoulder still ain't sitting right." Jazz said.

"I told you wrestling with Skywarp was a bad idea." Ratchet said dryly.

"Hey, if I hadn't jumped him when I did, I'd have to do all of Prowl's paperwork _forever_. I'd go crazy. I think you'll agree that my sanity is a little more important than a dislocated shoulder." Jazz said, sounding mock-offended.

"If you ask me, you never had any sanity in the first place." Wheeljack said cheerfully.

"Pot, kettle." Ratchet commented mildly.

"Slag, I was betting on 'takes one to know one'." Wheeljack said with mock disappointment. Ratchet chuckled slightly, and then the banter quieted. There were light murmurs as Wheeljack fixed up Jazz's shoulder, but nothing much was said until the inventor finally announced that Jazz was free to go.

"Thanks Jack!" Jazz said cheerfully, and Prowl was glad that the saboteur had said that while walking towards him, because it gave him warning so he wasn't overly startled when Jazz's hand suddenly landed on his shoulder. "Hey, when you're out of here, head down to the rec room. Got a surprise for ya."

"If I have the time." Prowl said with a nod. Which, when said to Jazz, was tantamount to saying he was going. Jazz knew it, too, and left whistling. Ratchet waited a few seconds after the doors closed to speak up.

"I've figured out what's going on, but unfortunately there's not much I can do about it. The way everything's hooked up in your cranium, your battle simulator is always receiving data from your sensors. I can't change it without deactivating the entire simulator." Ratchet said.

"And my simulator is an integrated part of my CPU." Prowl said.

"Exactly. So I can't turn it off without turning off your CPU." Ratchet said dryly. "And having just put you back together, I'd rather not kill you just yet."

"So there's nothing you can do?" Prowl asked.

"Unfortunately, no. You're going to have to deal with the stress of having your system shunt about two copies of your sensor data. I suggest regular breaks - or dialing them down for periods of time when you shouldn't need them as much, such as when you're doing paperwork." Ratchet said.

"I'll see what works." Prowl replied, unable to keep his disappointment out of his voice.

"On the plus side, your optics are healing nicely." Ratchet said reassuringly. "I'll be able to reactivate them in a week or so."

"I'll be glad when you can." Prowl said, sitting up on the berth and dialing back up his sensors.

"I'm sorry I can't really do anything for you, Prowl." Ratchet said, sounding upset that he couldn't help.

"You've done a lot already, Ratchet. I already owe you my life many times over." Prowl said. Ratchet snorted.

"More like Prime owes you his life many times over, and therefore owes me his life many times over. How many times have you taken a blast for him? And don't try to tell me you didn't see that missile in time to dodge the explosion - I've seen you react with less warning. You just knew Prime was behind you." Ratchet scolded.

"I think that's my cue to leave." Prowl said, jumping off the berth. Ratchet snorted, and Prowl said goodbye to him and Wheeljack before heading out, making his way down to the rec room, glad for the break in the med bay, which allowed the ache in his head to subside to a more reasonable level.

"That was fast." Jazz said from beside Prowl almost the moment he entered the rec room, startling the tactician slightly.

"Yes, Ratchet was just clarifying a few last things with me." Prowl stated.

"So you're fine now?" Jazz asked curiously.

"Yes." Prowl said with a nod.

"Good! Surprise time!" Jazz said brightly, then grabbed Prowl's arm and dragged him to the far side of the rec room, where the various sources of entertainment were set up. In this case, Jazz made a beeline for where the Cybertronian-sized chessboard had been installed. Prowl noticed an audible quieting of the rec room around them as they came to a stop by the chessboard, and could all but feel Jazz's expectant stare on him. Prowl himself was at a loss - to his crippled vision, the chessboard looked...unremarkable. He'd never made detailed scans of it before, so he couldn't discern whatever changes had obviously be made.

"Toldja he wouldn't like it." Gears grumped from somewhere nearby.

"Hey now! Maybe he just doesn't like y'all watchin' him like hawks!" Jazz said, sounding offended.

"You messed with The Chess Board, Jazz. There's gotta be a regulation against that somewhere." Trailbreaker said with a laugh.

"Hardly." Prowl said. "It's just...disconcerting."

"So you _don't_ like it." Jazz said, chuckling, but still sounding disappointed.

"No, I like it. I just need to get used to it." Prowl insisted, hoping he wouldn't regret saying that later.

"Well, no time like the present!" Jazz said, instantly perking up. "Siddown, let's have a game!" Oh that _so_ wasn't a good idea.

"I'm afraid I really must get back to work." Prowl said. His processor still ached, and he would love to take a longer break, but no way was he going to suffer his first ever loss at chess in the middle of a crowded rec room, even if it would be to Jazz. And it _would _be a loss without his battle simulator to help him out. "Perhaps later?" Prowl suggested.

"Aw, c'mon, just one game?" Jazz wheedled. "They never take long against you, anyways."

"Then we will have plenty of time for multiple games later." Prowl said with a small nod, then turned and headed out. Jazz followed.

"I'll switch it back." Jazz said once they were out of audio range of the rec room, sounding dejected. Prowl stopped, turning to look at Jazz, then up and down the hallways carefully, making sure there was no one else around.

"It's not the chessboard, Jazz." he said seriously, already mentally berating himself for what he was about to say. His soft spot for Jazz had gotten far too big lately. "My battle simulator is still offline." There was a long pause. Prowl expected to hear some sort of comment about how he was trying to avoid losing to Jazz, but the saboteur surprised him.

"That explosion really fragged up your head, didn't it?" the saboteur asked finally, seriously.

"Yes, well, apparently taking the explosive force and heat of an oil storage tank to the face is rather damaging." Prowl said with sarcasm, trying to hide his surprise at the unexpectedly serious response.

"Apparently." Jazz said softly. "Prowl -"

"That paperwork is still waiting for me. I'll be happy to thoroughly test the alterations to the chessboard with you once I am fully recovered." Prowl interrupted, not wanting to hear Jazz's pity or sympathy.

"Of course. I look forward to it." Jazz said, his voice returning to his normal volume, and then with a cheerful 'seeya later!' the saboteur was gone. Prowl shook his head and trudged off to his office. He locked the door as soon as he arrived, sitting down and poking through the data pads, for once not in the mood to actually work on any of them, even to get his mind off things. Still, they needed to be done, and so he dialed down his sensors and connected to the first one - a report from Perceptor. Lovely. Prowl put it back and dug until he found a report from Wheeljack. Perhaps the inventor's enthusiasm and amusing, and by now somewhat sheepish, euphemisms for blowing himself or his lab up could keep Prowl focused.

* * *

It was much later in the afternoon when Prowl became aware of a tickling at the edge of his sensors, and frowning, he glanced up from the data pad, wincing as he suddenly realized he'd gotten so absorbed in his work he hadn't noticed the massive headache he'd accumulated. Then he heard the sound of his door opening, and he straightened in surprise as a familiar form stepped inside. He opened his mouth to ask Jazz to wait a moment, so he could disconnect from the pad, but the saboteur was already speaking. With the data from the pad streaming through his CPU, though, Prowl could only catch every few words of what Jazz was saying.

Figuring it would be faster than trying to stop Jazz talking about whatever had gotten him excited enough to override the lock on Prowl's door, Prowl opted to just disconnect himself from the pad as quickly as possible. It wasn't fast enough, however, and his limited vision blurred together as he turned his head to track Jazz's movement as the saboteur suddenly came around to his side of the desk.

And then all thought processes, even those involving disconnecting from the pad, ceased altogether, as Prowl felt something he never thought he would. Jazz...kissing him.

Prowl's systems screamed at him, protesting the halted disconnect, the excess sensory information, and his reflexive, repeated attempts to activate his optics. The tactician didn't pay any attention to them, trying to figure out where in Primus' name this development had come from. He barely even noticed when Jazz pulled away, completely missed it if the saboteur said anything. Then Prowl's system's couldn't be ignored, and he snapped out of his shock in time to realize that he was about to suffer a system crash.

"Frag! _Ratchet!"_ The last was all but yelled over the comm system, and then all sensory input ceased. The red warning of a system crash was the last thing Prowl was conscious of before he went offline altogether.

**- TBC -**


	2. Chapter 2

**Disclaimer:** Not mine.

**Original Author's Note:** Considering that normally one song is all it takes to inspire me to write a fic, I'm rather staggered by the sheer number of songs that have gone into this one. There's at least 15 at this point...I think I'm gonna blame Prowl and Hound and just leave it there. :P

**- Stairway to Heaven : Chapter Two -**

_"Ratchet, get the frag down here!"_ Jazz's almost hysterical voice followed on the heels of Prowl's alarmed cry, startling Ratchet from his report to Prime on Prowl's injuries.

_"Where exactly is 'here'?"_ Ratchet snapped over the comm system, already out of his office and gathering basic tools.

_"Prowl's office, he just crashed!"_ Jazz replied, sounding somewhat calmer, but still a lot more freaked out than he would have been if it was one of Prowl's usual logic lock-ups. Which meant it was probably due to Prowl's injuries. Ratchet cursed and transformed, speeding through the hallways and barreling past mechs, focused on getting to Prowl as fast as possible. It was unlikely Prowl was in any lethal danger, but when it came to his charges' processors, Ratchet preferred not to take any chances.

He ended up being glad he had, as the first thing his gaze settled on when he stepped into Prowl's office was the data pad still in the tactician's hand. He swore vehemently - he had little doubt that Prowl was still connected to it.

"Jazz, out, now. Go get Perceptor, tell him I'll need him in the med bay immediately." Ratchet ordered. Jazz seemed uncommonly shaken, but did as asked, heading out at a dead run, while Ratchet headed over and began taking scans. He heard voices behind him, but didn't pay attention as he attempted to finish what appeared to be an aborted disconnect from the pad on Prowl's part. The medic spared a moment to wonder how on earth Prowl had gotten into this mess when he was aware of a large presence behind him.

"Good. Since you're the reason he's injured, you can take him to med bay." the medic declared, turning to glare at Optimus. The matrix-bearer winced, looking regretful. "Just because I said it's your fault doesn't mean you're allowed to feel guilty about it. Now get moving!" Ratchet snapped. Optimus quickly did as ordered, never mind that Ratchet couldn't actually order him to do anything in this situation.

The hallways were surprisingly clear of mechs, but Ratchet reminded himself that everyone in the Ark probably thought Prowl's processor had just locked up again. Only the medics and Optimus knew how serious this could be - Ratchet had discussed the risks of wiring Prowl's visual center this way with Optimus before doing it, but they'd both agreed that Prowl was a sensible enough mech not to get in exactly this sort of mess. Considering the evidence on hand, however, Ratchet considered Prowl's record for idiotic behaviour still clean and was blaming Jazz instead.

"Ratchet, what has happened?" Perceptor asked, joining them in the corridor worriedly.

"Preliminary scans show his entire visual center is overheated, and possibly suffering a critical system crash." Ratchet said succinctly.

"Oh my." Perceptor murmured.

"Oh my indeed." Ratchet said with a snort as they entered the med bay. Optimus was a smart enough mech to set Prowl down on the intensive care berth, which had all the various systems support equipment hooked up to it, not to mention every type of scanner Ratchet could ever possibly need. Then the big mech got out of the way, likely herding Jazz, Bluestreak, and the twins back to their jobs. Those four always tended to drop what they were doing when they found out Prowl was hurt somehow, even if it was just a processor lock-up. But then, Inferno and Ironhide always appeared out of the woodwork when Red Alert fritzed out, too. They didn't just drop what they were doing and coming running like the other four, though.

Ratchet shook his head, pushing aside his random musings about the habits of certain mechs to come running when other mechs were injured, and focused on the task at hand. Perceptor was already at work, doing what he could to stabilize and support Prowl's systems, leaving Ratchet to find the root of the problem and solve it. So, with a sigh, Ratchet set to work.

* * *

"Good morning, sunshine!" Prowl almost flinched at the cheery tone - he'd heard from Sideswipe that Ratchet could get worse than 'welcome back', but this was the first time he'd experienced it. "Congratulations, you managed to fry your entire visual center. If you could see right now, I'd give you the smoldering lump of _slag_ that's all that's left of it to inspect. However, you can't see, and due to a shortage of parts thanks to your unique cranial structure, you won't be _able _to see until I get the parts I need from Cybertron, and Wheeljack manages to build some of them from scratch, without ever having had any experience in building such parts before." The cheerful tone turned progressively more sour as the medic continued, until Prowl could almost see the medic's scowl. Tentatively, he tried to activate his visual center, just to confirm what he was hearing, and groaned when his CPU didn't just send back a 'unavailable' message - it asked him what exactly he was looking for and suggested running a diagnostic on his cognitive subroutines.

"What happened?" Prowl asked, sifting through his databanks and trying to figure out how he'd gone from doing paperwork to frying his visual center.

"Technically? Sensory overload and an aborted disconnect caused a massive system crash, the feedback from which fried your visual center. If you want to know how said system crash was triggered, I don't know, though Jazz was apparently with you when it happened. I would suggest asking him." Ratchet said. Prowl frowned - he vaguely remembered Jazz entering his office, but it was very...disjointed. He shook his head as attempting to remember caused his processor to ache.

"I will have to do that." he said. "I take it I'm off-duty until this is fixed?"

"Of course. Also, Prime has a briefing scheduled in a few hours to inform the senior officers of your temporary disability, and will be sending out a memo to the rest of the crew afterwards." Ratchet said.

"Ah. Do you have any sort of an estimation as to how long it will be before you can build me a new visual center and install it?" Prowl asked warily, prepared for Ratchet to blow up at the question. The medic, thankfully, didn't.

"Two weeks. Minimum. Considering the reliability of our ability to get supplies from Cybertron, however, it could be up to three months." Ratchet stated flatly. "And once I install it, you'll be on light duty for another week to allow your systems time to acclimatize to the new center."

"Oh." Prowl murmured.

"And you're confined to the Ark for all of that." Ratchet added.

"Of course." Prowl said with a bit of a sigh.

"On the plus side," Ratchet continued, "This whole thing also fried your port for direct linking."

"How is that a plus?" Prowl asked in confusion.

"I had to replace it, and I gave you a better one, with specific filters already installed. It will prevent the type of system damage that caused this crash." Ratchet said, then added somewhat snappishly, "And if you're wondering why I didn't give you one before to prevent this from happening, it's because Wheeljack lost the box they were in and didn't remember where it was until yesterday."

"Well...at least I have it now." Prowl observed.

"Indeed. It will allow you to access data pads, but Prime has agreed with me that you're still to be off duty until I can install a new visual center." Ratchet said. "I'm not quite sure how you could damage yourself more while doing simple paperwork, but I must remember that you're only this injured because you managed to mess up _while _doing paperwork in the first place."

"You make it sound like I'm prone to getting injured." Prowl said defensively.

"I believe I already mentioned how I considered you completely melting your visual center to be too remote to consider a viable possibility?" Ratchet said icily. "Now, do you want me to call someone to take you back to your quarters until Prime's briefing, or would you rather stay here?"

"I might as well stay here. You're going, I assume?" Prowl said after a moment, somewhat grouchily.

"Of course I am." Ratchet said with a snort. "And if you're going to stay here, I suggest you lie there and try to remember how you got into this mess, because I don't keep data pads on hand to amuse bored tacticians."

"I wouldn't expect you to." Prowl said.

"Good." Ratchet said, followed by the sound of his footsteps heading away. Prowl's sensors informed him the medic didn't go far, but it was still disconcerting. The information from his sensors, without his visual center, was...less than helpful. So instead of thinking back as to how he got into the med bay in the first place, Prowl decided, first, to go through his sensors and deactivate the ones giving him useless data that was unprocessable without a visual center. In the end, almost half his sensors were deactivated, and while he wasn't technically anymore blind than he had be when he started, Prowl swore he felt more so.

"Ready to go?" the question startled Prowl, and he fought hard not to jump off the berth. Focusing his sensors in the right direction, he relaxed as they registered Ratchet, waiting a decent distance away.

"Time for the meeting already?" Prowl asked with mild surprise.

"Technically it started five minutes ago, but Prime is still looking for Jazz." Ratchet added the last almost as an afterthought, so it took a moment for it to register for Prowl.

"Looking for Jazz? Is he missing?" the tactician asked curiously, sitting up and swinging his legs over the side of the berth.

"Apparently he disappeared after he got Perceptor and nobody's seen him since." Ratchet replied as Prowl stood up and the two headed out of the med bay, Prowl's sensors providing him with enough information to walk without running into or tripping over anything, though he couldn't tell exactly where he was going. "He's not answering his comms, either. Frankly I think he feels he crashed your visual center and is off feeling guilty somewhere."

"That is hardly like Jazz." Prowl pointed out. The saboteur was more likely to completely disrupt the Ark with his over-the-top attempts to apologize if he felt guilty.

"Well I don't think he's angry at anyone, and that's _usually_ his reason for running off like this." Ratchet said dryly. "Then again, maybe you two had a fight and that was why you crashed?" the dig for information was obvious, and Prowl shook his head, mildly amused.

"It's all still very blurry - too much sensory information has corrupted the memory files." the tactician said. "I am attempting to sort it out, however."

"Good. Because I'd _love_ to know why Jazz will be getting his newest dent when he appears." Ratchet replied. The conversation ended there as they reached the briefing room, Ratchet opening the door for them to enter. Stepping inside, Prowl did a quick sensor sweep, disappointed to find Jazz missing, despite Ratchet's prior warning. A nagging voice at the back of his CPU was telling him the saboteur needed to be here to hear this. There was nothing he could do to get Jazz there, however, and Prowl reluctantly took his seat, feeling the curious gazes of the other attendees - Prime, Ironhide, Red Alert, and Wheeljack - as he moved.

"Now that we're mostly here." Prime began, sounding just slightly annoyed over the missing Jazz. "I'm sure you've all heard of Prowl's recent trip to med bay. What you probably don't know is just how serious it was. Ratchet?" There was a heavy thunk on the table that caused Prowl to jump slightly, glaring in Ratchet's direction.

"_That_ is the remains of Prowl's visual center." Ratchet stated, ignoring Prowl's glare, as he always did. "Sensory overload and an aborted disconnect caused a massive system crash, the feedback from which did _this_." There was a moment of silence.

"Aborted disconnect? What was he connected to? And what on base could possibly give him sensory overload?" Red Alert asked tensely.

"I was unable to completely repair Prowl's optics from the last battle, so I rerouted his sensors through his visual center to allow his optics time to self-repair." Ratchet replied. "Thus, he had to directly connect to a data pad to read it. That, plus the strain of his sensors suddenly going to maximum because a _certain saboteur_ had cracked the lock on his office door, resulted in sensory overload and an aborted disconnect. Or at least that's my best guess. Prowl's memory files prior to crashing are understandably corrupted, and the only other one that could explain is mysteriously missing." With the facts laid out like that, it didn't take Red Alert long to wonder if Jazz was turning against them, purposefully crashing Prowl's CPU, and the meeting quickly degraded from there. Prime called it to order, allowing Wheeljack to explain what he'd need to build Prowl a new visual center, including a trip to Cybertron. The meeting concluded with Ratchet informing them all that Prowl was off duty and confined to the Ark until his visual center was replaced, and then Wheeljack and Ironhide went off to find Smokescreen to make plans for a mission to Cybertron to get the parts to engineer needed.

In the briefing room, Optimus stayed behind as Red Alert and Ratchet left, quietly offering to walk Prowl back to his quarters - clearly Ratchet had informed the commander that Prowl would not be able to navigate on his own. Prowl accepted the offer with an uncomfortable 'thank you', which Prime brushed off.

"We haven't needed 'thank you's for a long time, Prowl." Optimus said, sounding somewhat weary.

"I...suppose not." Prowl replied, understanding what the Prime was getting at. They walked the rest of the way in awkward silence, but despite that, Optimus offered to stay and keep Prowl company once they'd arrived.

"I'll be fine." Prowl reassured his leader, knowing Optimus had work to get back to, and the Prime hesitated only a moment longer before accepting the goodbye and leaving. Prowl sighed as he entered his quarters, glad that Optimus had chosen to leave - the last thing he needed was an attempt at socialization from the one mech on the base who was perhaps worse at it than he was. Especially when said mech was doing so because he felt guilty about Prowl's situation.

Inside his quarters, Prowl found himself glad that he'd bolted all his furniture to the floor in a pre-emptive defense against Jazz and Sideswipe. His main navigation system may be tied into sensors that were either inoperable or deactivated, but it wasn't hard for him to remember the layout of his room when it had been that way for vorns. So he carefully made his way around his room to the shelf he kept his recreational data pads on. They were a mixture of Cybertronian texts and human ones transferred onto data pads, and Prowl had actually collected a fair number of them. He didn't have much time to read, but he would keep running across things he would like to read, so he'd made a habit of just collecting the things he did want to read, in the hopes he'd have the time to do so. Well, now apparently he had time.

Picking one at random, since he couldn't tell them apart anyways, Prowl went over to his berth and settled himself comfortably before using voice-commands to get Teletraan to lock his door and comm him should anyone try and enter. When Teletraan sent back an affirmative, Prowl tentatively hooked into the data pad, and when he felt the security of the new port, and had explored it a bit and discovered that Ratchet was right, there would be no repeat, Prowl began reading.

* * *

Prowl's quiet was only disturbed much later, when Ratchet thought to bring him some energon, and check to see if he'd remembered anything about what had caused him to crash, considering Jazz was still missing. The medic was now sounding concerned, but Prowl was still clueless, and told Ratchet so. The medic left disappointed, but ordered Prowl to get a good night's recharge on his way out, and Prowl agreed equitably as he sipped at his energon.

Once Ratchet had left, Prowl didn't pick up the pad again as he usually might have, however. Ratchet's visit reminded him of the holes in his memory, and he focused on it, trying to sort things out carefully. He got little for his attempts except frustration, however, and in a last ditch effort, activated a defragmentation program for that particular section of his memory and went into recharge while it ran. It meant he'd probably be out longer than normal, but it wasn't like he had duty the next morning.

Apparently Ratchet was still watching out for him, however, as Prowl woke to the medic poking at him.

"One day off duty and already you're over-recharging? Really Prowl. I had no idea you could be so _lazy_ when you weren't being a workaholic." Ratchet sounded entertained as he gave Prowl a cube of energon.

"I was running a defragmentation program on the memories from right before I crashed." Prowl explained.

"You _what!"_ Ratchet growled. "You know how dangerous that is without medical supervision Prowl!"

"I coded it specifically for the precise time frame that was disrupted, and closed access to the rest of my memory." Prowl responded calmly. "There was no risk." Ratchet growled again.

"Only you would treat a possible self-induced vorn-long _coma_ so lightly. Why did I ever think you'd be able to manage your sensors routed through your visual cortex without trouble?" the medic grumbled.

"Perhaps because I could have, had Jazz not come along." Prowl replied easily, then froze as soon as he said that, the comment suddenly making him realize that the defrag had worked.

"Prowl?" Ratchet asked curiously, seeing the tactician freeze. "Did you remember?" the medic guessed after a few moments of silence.

"Yes...I did." Prowl said softly, sounding surprised even to himself. "It's still...broken, but I think that's the way it was when it started out."

"So what happened to make you crash?" Ratchet asked, clearly curious, but there was also a hard tone in his voice that obviously wanted to know what to rant at Jazz about. Prowl remained silent for a long moment - what had happened wasn't any of Ratchet's business, really.

"Jazz surprised me." Prowl said finally.

"That's all?" Ratchet asked in disbelief.

"That was quite enough, given the situation." Prowl replied shortly, and Ratchet got the hint. The medic may have seemed socially crippled, but he was more observant than most mechs gave him credit for. He made some more small talk with Prowl, mostly about the data pad Prowl had been reading before Ratchet had brought him energon last night, before excusing himself for his duties. When he was gone, Prowl turned his attention to his memories, feeling something like wonder wash over him.

Most of it was still a blur, giving him only vague impressions, but there was one part that was crystal clear, and frankly, that was the only part Prowl cared about, anyways. Carefully, Prowl examined that one intact part of the memory, knowing that the desire to keep the memory perfect was what had truly caused him to crash - despite what Ratchet thought, Prowl really was at fault. Had he continued the disconnect, he would have been fine, but he'd allowed himself to get...distracted. And so gloriously so. The tactician felt a wide grin cross his face as he remembered the sensation of Jazz kissing him, and basked in the knowledge that there was at least something there.

Pleased, Prowl picked up the data pad he'd been reading the day before and set about finishing it - Ratchet had said he'd bring him energon again that night, and Prowl could ask him if Jazz had appeared then. It wouldn't be proper for Prowl to seem _too_ interested in Jazz's whereabouts, after all. Almost humming to himself, Prowl connected to the pad and turned his CPU to the story, feeling more cheerful than he had in almost a vorn.

**- TBC -**


	3. Chapter 3

**Disclaimer:** Not mine.

**Author's Note: **In which Jazz is an idiot and Hound unwittingly creates a monster.

**- Stairway to Heaven : Chapter Three -**

Jazz had indeed appeared that day, but seemed determined to avoid Prowl, and no matter how many times Prowl attempted to comm him, or Ratchet told the saboteur to go visit Prowl, the tactician never once heard from the other mech. Feeling frustrated, Prowl finally decided to take matters into his own hands and go to Jazz.

Unfortunately, he decided this after Ratchet had left for the day, and so Prowl found himself walking carefully down the corridor, trailing one hand along the wall as he wracked his CPU to remember the path to the rec room. It shouldn't have been hard, but he was usually distracted by work when he walked there and just let his navigation systems take over. Now, he found himself rather clueless, hesitating uncertainly as he came to an intersection. Footsteps sounded behind Prowl, and he turned his head, despite the uselessness of the gesture, and warred with himself for a moment as to whether or not to ask for directions.

"Prowl?" the side of him rooting for asking directions wasn't helped as Prowl identified the voice as Sideswipe's.

"Are there many mechs wandering around the Ark looking like me these days?" Prowl asked to cover up his own confusion about which way to go.

"S'pose not." Sideswipe said with a laugh. "Just haven't seen you recently - Sunny, Blue and I have been out in New York."

"Ah." Prowl said - he'd been wondering where they were. It was unusual for them to go so long without visiting him, even when he was uninjured. Well, maybe not the twins, but Bluestreak definitely.

"Heard about what happened though. Sunny and Blue went to your quarters to check on you." Sideswipe said after a moment, speaking carefully.

"Mmm. It was getting...boring in there." Prowl said, coming up with an excuse quickly.

"Ah. So where were you headed?" Sideswipe asked. Prowl hesitated.

"The rec room." the tactician said. There was a long pause, and Prowl wondered why, until Sideswipe spoke up, sounding like he was trying very hard not to laugh.

"Your navigation systems are fragged up without your visual center, aren't they?" the other mech asked, and Prowl frowned, wondering how Sideswipe had known.

"Where am I?" he asked with a sigh as he realized what had most likely tipped Sideswipe off.

"Near the weapons lockers. Opposite side of your quarters from the rec room." the red mech was chuckling now, and then Prowl's proximity sensors gave him brief alerts as Sideswipe stepped closer. A touch on his arm made Prowl stiffen, but Sideswipe just grabbed his elbow and tugged Prowl back the way he'd come. "C'mon, I'll get you to the rec room."

"I can follow you without you tugging me along." Prowl said with annoyance, pulling his arm free, and Sideswipe chuckled.

"Fine, whatever you say." he said as he walked, and Prowl determinedly focused on following him. The path began to seem familiar after a bit, even though Prowl still couldn't predict the turns, but he knew Sideswipe was leading him in the right direction.

Entering the rec room itself was surprisingly startling, as the sounds hit Prowl without the added focus of his optics to help him block people out. It was rather confusing, and Prowl struggled to sort through it, until a hand on his shoulder made him realize that he'd been standing in the doorway. Still unable to sort one sound from another, Prowl let himself be led to a table and pushed down into a chair, frowning as he slowly began to pick apart the sounds.

_"Prowl?"_Sideswipe comm'ed, making Prowl twitch slightly.

_"One moment. All the sound is...chaotic." _the tactician replied shortly and returned to his efforts. Gradually, he sorted through the sounds, calibrating his sensors to tune individual ones out based on the degradation of the sound waves, essentially make up for not being able to calculate the distance visually. Finally, he became aware of the conversation immediately around him, and the fact that Sideswipe had led him to a table with Sunstreaker and Bluestreak. He must have made some outward appearance of finally being able to hear them, as the conversation abruptly changed focus to him.

"Better now, Prowl?" Sideswipe asked, and Prowl nodded.

"Much." the tactician said.

"Boy, your visual center sure is tied into a lot of things!" Blue commented. "I mean, it's bad enough not being able to see, but getting lost is just not fun. Unless you're exploring, and then it's great. We did that in New York, just drove around for hours while Sideswipe was at the UN. It was a lot of fun - well, Sunny didn't think so, but some kid offered to wash his window right off when we were stopped at a light and I think that put him off."

"The UN?" Prowl asked in surprise, suddenly recalling he'd been supposed to go talk to them about the current trade agreements between the Autobots and the human governments.

"Prime, in his infinite wisdom, decided I was the best choice for your replacement now that you can't go." Sideswipe grumped.

"Considering the topic, you were probably the next best qualified." Prowl said with amusement.

"That was what he said! But I never had do work on such a large scale before!" Sideswipe whined. "I mean, do we _really_ use that much stuff? Every _year?"_

"Perhaps now you'll think twice about wasting supplies?" Prowl asked dryly.

"Frag no! Not after Prime made me go through all that!" Sideswipe retorted, and Prowl shook his head. Of course Sideswipe would take such an experience to mean that he deserved to waste supplies rather than as a lesson to conserve them. He wouldn't be Sideswipe otherwise. Bluestreak piped up after that, telling Prowl about some of the highlights of their trip, and Prowl let himself get swept up in the conversation, all the while tuning his sensors in the hopes of catching Jazz's name or presence in the rec room.

The saboteur was strangely absent, however, despite the fact that Prowl spent the entire day in the rec room. Bluestreak and the twins had to leave eventually, but other mechs came to chat Prowl up, and it surprised him to discover just how much he had to talk about with all of them. Even without resorting to work as a topic, he knew more about the mechs he worked with than he thought - he supposed it was because he saw them all so frequently, often to talk about this report or that mission, and read so many of said reports, that he'd picked up on their personalities, dislikes, likes, hobbies, and whatnot. As it grew later and the rec room began to quiet, Prowl found himself re-evaluating his self-imposed label of an antisocial mech.

And then Prowl realized that the rec room was too quiet. Alarmed, Prowl ran his sensors over the room and realized he was the only one left. Checking his chronometer, Prowl found it to be the dead of night, right in the middle of the night shift. No wonder everyone had gone. Prowl should probably head back to his quarters himself - Ratchet would have a fit if he knew the tactician had been up this late so soon after leaving med bay.

Prowl stood, then made his way to the door. Outside, he found himself searching back to remember the path Sideswipe had led him on to get there. It was still uncertain in his CPU, but he set off after a few moments, confident of his initial direction, at least.

He'd gotten several corridors along, and was getting more uncertain about his route, by the time he heard the sound of an engine behind him, and he stopped as whoever it was screeched to a halt not far away and transformed.

"Primus Prowl, I am so sorry! I totally forgot you wouldn't know your way back!" Sideswipe was apologizing immediately, and the tactician could practically see the pathetic look on the red twin's faceplate.

"It's fine. Now that you're here, however..." Prowl trailed off.

"Yeah, no problem!" Sideswipe said brightly, and with a little tug on Prowl's elbow to get him started, Sideswipe led the way back to Prowl's quarters.

"I can find my way around my quarters easily enough." Prowl told Sideswipe when the red twin hesitated at his door.

"Um, yeah, I figured, I just..." Sideswipe paused for a moment. "Aw slaggit, there's no polite translation. Sunny said to remind you to visit the wash racks soon, and that if you need help, you can comm him." Sideswipe seemed aggrieved at the pointed suggestion from his twin, and Prowl couldn't stop the small smile that escaped.

"If he's up for it, I believe I have tomorrow morning free." Prowl replied, having actually considered that conundrum earlier in the day when Sunstreaker had gone on one of his rants about his finish.

"Really?" Sideswipe seemed surprised.

"Yes. But he has to help me get there." Prowl said dryly.

"Ah - of course. He'll be here." Sideswipe still sounded surprised as Prowl bid him a goodnight and went into his quarters.

* * *

To say the next morning was awkward was an understatement, but it got easier after Sunstreaker scared the other mechs out of the wash racks and Prowl used his codes to lock it. Apparently the other mechs couldn't quite understand the fact that Prowl, unable to see anything, would also have trouble figuring out where he was _dirty._Fortunately they had all been of the opinion that Sunstreaker was helping Sideswipe with some sort of prank, and not something less wholesome. Which had perhaps been worse, considering the verbal beatings they'd been gearing up to give Sunstreaker.

"I'm surprised more of them don't realize just how much we actually see of each other, thanks to Bluestreak." Prowl mused as Sunstreaker helped him clean off the dirt he'd accumulated.

"That's because most of them only see in pairs. Sideswipe and myself, Bluestreak and you, Bluestreak and myself. You could probably ask one of them who was sitting at our table yesterday morning and they'd say me and Sides or you and Blue." Sunstreaker replied, sounding annoyed. Prowl arched an optic ridge at the almost-rant, but didn't comment, letting Sunstreaker continue helping him. Once the golden twin declared him clean enough, he helped Prowl buffs out the scratches, but Prowl refused to let the other mech touch up his paint or help with polish.

"I'll go to Hoist if I really need it." Prowl said, warily.

"In other words, you trust me, but not that far?" Sunstreaker's grin was clear, and Prowl nodded.

"You are your brother's twin, after all. And don't think I don't know you prank just as much as he does." Prowl replied dryly. "You're just better at not leaving evidence."

"Can you repeat that, within Sideswipe's hearing range?" Sunstreaker asked, and Prowl just shook his head. When the golden twin asked where Prowl would like to go now, Prowl decided to try the rec room again in an attempt to run into Jazz, and Sunstreaker led him there.

Jazz was another no-show that day, though Prowl once again spent the remainder of the day in the rec room, chatting with the various mechs to go through. This time, however, Prowl wasn't left in the rec room by himself. It was late, a few hours into the start of the night shift, and Prowl had been left alone with his thoughts for the last half an hour or so when Gears suddenly stepped up beside the tactician.

"I'm heading out. Want to a walk back to your quarters?" the minibot unexpectedly offered, though his tone was clipped and almost belligerent. With surprise, Prowl scanned the rest of the rec room, but he and Gears were the last ones left.

"Ah - yes, thank you." Prowl said appreciatively, standing, and then followed Gears out. The minibot led him to his quarters without talking once, then said a gruff goodnight before taking off as soon as Prowl opened his door. Prowl shook his head in amusement before heading to his berth for recharge.

For the next several days, Prowl managed to get guides to and from the rec room, but Jazz never showed. After five days, he finally admitted defeat, and decided to just stay in his quarters. He was rather tired of the constant socialization, anyways - one of the reasons he'd labeled himself as anti-social was because he didn't really like dealing with other mechs and femmes all the time, and he was getting an overdose recently.

The problem with not going to the rec room, Prowl discovered, was that Ratchet was apparently used to him going to the rec room and didn't stop by with energon. The need for fuel eventually made Prowl leave his quarters, and this time he managed to make it most of the way to the rec room before taking a wrong turn and getting corrected by a passing Tracks, who was heading the same way and 'graciously' let Prowl follow him. Prowl made a mental note to stick Tracks on particularly unpleasant duties when he was able to do so again.

The tactician got his energon quickly, but found himself unwilling to ask anyone to leave just to show him back to his quarters. So, grateful that he'd brought his datapad with him, he settled down in a corner to read. It was difficult to concentrate, though, with so much noise around him, and eventually Prowl gave up and joined in the conversation again. This much socialization was beginning to wear, though. If he was more short with people than normal, nobody commented, but Prowl eventually grabbed Bluestreak as the younger mech was leaving for his shift and asked for a walk back to his quarters. The younger mech was as talkative as usual, and Prowl found himself scowling and wishing he'd grabbed a different mech as he followed Bluestreak through the corridors, the gunner stopping to talk to what seemed like everyone in the Ark along the way.

"Hey Blue, Prowl." Prowl had to stop a sigh of annoyance as Bluestreak stopped yet again as Hound greeted them.

"Hi Hound! How's your evening been? You on night shift tonight, or just coming off of it?" Bluestreak asked brightly.

"I was actually just going to go out for a late-night stroll." Hound said. "Aren't you on the night shift this week?"

"Yeah, I was just walking Prowl back to his quarters first." Bluestreak replied happily.

"You're gonna be late if you do that." Hound commented. "Tell ya what, I'll get him the rest of the way, you can get to your shift."

"Well..." Bluestreak hesitated.

"It's fine, Bluestreak." Prowl said, for once jumping at the opportunity to get rid of the younger mech. Bluestreak still seemed reluctant, but Hound promised he'd get Prowl back safe and sound, and eventually Bluestreak left. Hound waited only for Prowl to nod before starting to walk.

"You looked like you could use a rescue." Hound said after a few moments of silence. Prowl smiled tightly in response, and the scout chuckled, but said no more as he led the way.

"Why do you keep coming to the rec room, anyways?" Hound asked unexpectedly just as Prowl was about to enter his quarters. The tactician looked over at the scout in surprise.

"Originally? To look for Jazz. Today I just wanted some energon." Prowl replied honestly after a moment, knowing the scout wasn't one to gossip or tease.

"Ah, yeah, he has been avoiding you quite skillfully. Sneaking in and out of the rec room at odd times to grab energon." Hound said with a chuckle, and Prowl frowned.

"I figured." he said.

"Why's he avoiding you, anyways?" Hound asked curiously.

"That's part of why I want to find him. " Prowl said with some irritation. Hound hmm'ed thoughtfully.

"I'd suggest cornering Jazz while on duty, but that would give him too many outs." the scout commented. "He can't keep up his unusual schedule forever. Sooner or later he'll have to come to the rec room to get energon while you're there." Prowl made a non-committal noise. "But you'd probably be driven mad by all the socialization first, eh?" Hound guessed accurately, chuckling. "Tell ya what. You can still connect to datapads, right?"

"It's far too noisy to read." Prowl replied shortly. He knew he shouldn't be short with Hound, but his patience for chatter was next to non-existent at this point.

"Yeah, got a better idea. I'll show you tomorrow." Hound said brightly. "I'll stop by around midday, that alright?" Since that gave Prowl some time to himself, the tactician decided it was fine, and nodded. "Great, seeya then!" Hound said cheerfully, then headed off. Prowl just shook his head and entered his quarters.

* * *

Hound showed up almost exactly at noon the next day, and besides a cheerful 'good morning', was blessedly untalkative as he walked Prowl to the rec room. Numerous mechs greeted them both upon entrance, but Hound didn't let them distract him, pulling Prowl over to a table in the corner, sitting the tactician down and handing him a datapad.

"Here, have a look at this while I get some energon." Hound said, sounding pleased with himself. Curious now, Prowl connected to the datapad, and was startled as he read the title. Activating some of his more precise sensors, Prowl stretched them out in his immediate vicinity, and was surprised to find the large organic mass on the table in front of him. He'd heard about it when Hound had gotten it, of course, but he'd never actually had the opportunity to see or hear it. Thoughtfully, Prowl deactivated the sensors and set the pad down as Hound returned.

"Well?" Hound asked as he handed Prowl his cube.

"You're suggesting I learn how to play guitar." Prowl said, just to confirm.

"Yep." Hound said, once again sounding pleased. "It'll give you something to focus on that'll block out the noise of the rec room, and allow you to wait around for Jazz, especially if you practice by the door or something, without necessarily having to socialize."

"I have absolutely no artistic ability." Prowl commented.

"Have you tried?" Hound asked pleasantly. Prowl opened his mouth to say that yes, he had, but then frowned thoughtfully.

"Not...technically." he murmured, reaching out lightly to touching the organic mass that was the over-sized guitar some famous human singer had made for Hound as a gift after he went to several of their concerts, claiming to like the music.

"Human music and instruments are vastly different from Cybertonian ones." Hound said, confirming what Prowl had caught on to. The tactician's creators had been determined to give him a well-rounded background, and he'd taken several music and arts courses when he was younger, but he'd only barely passed most of them. They were still the lowest marks, by a long shot, on his academic record.

"I suppose it can't hurt to try." Prowl mused.

"Nope. And if you really can't do it, well, you can always see it as payback for all the stress we've all caused you." Hound said with a laugh. "Though if you get my guitar broken you'll be getting me a new one."

"Of course." Prowl replied with a nod. "I take it you still have all the datapads you used to learn?"

"Yep. That's just the first one." Hound said. "I'll dig out the rest tonight and bring them tomorrow." Prowl murmured a thank you, and Hound accepted the thanks equitably as they continued to drink their energon. The scout was one of Prowl's more silent table partners, and either he was doing something with his holograms or the two of them were putting off a strong 'do not disturb' vibe, as no one interrupted the rest of their mostly silent lunch. Once they'd finished their energon, Hound helped Prowl figure out how to hold the guitar, where the strings were and what they did, and so on. Prowl was vaguely aware of curious murmurs around them, but Hound was right - with the sound of the guitar to focus on, it was easier to push them aside, and only loud noises caught his attention as he focused on Hound's instructions and the guitar.

Eventually the scout had to head out on patrol, of course, but Prowl just picked up the datapad and went off that, finding that Hound had talked him through the first couple of chapters. Moving on to the new ones, Prowl found himself quickly absorbed in the instructions and the guitar, making himself practice the exercises repeatedly until he got them right every time before heading on to the next ones. He was so focused that the hand on his shoulder much later made him jump in surprise, and he whipped his head around on instinct, before he remembered it wouldn't do any good.

"Prowl." Optimus' deep voice was perhaps the last one Prowl had expected to hear.

"Optimus." Prowl said after a moment's pause, then carefully set the guitar down on the table as Optimus moved, and he heard the ominous creaking sound all of the rec room chairs made when Optimus sat in them. They were never close to breaking, but Optimus was one of the larger bots in the Ark. Grimlock had the same problem, and usually remained standing, not trusting the chairs.

"How are you doing?" Optimus asked once he'd settled himself. Prowl considered the question carefully.

"As well as I can." he said eventually. "It's...odd not having work to do, and I find myself latching onto things that will keep me busy." Prowl motioned to the guitar on the table.

"Yes, Ratchet has been worried that you're pushing yourself, even without work." Optimus commented.

"I don't feel strained or tired." Prowl said with a shrug. "But then I'm hardly doing anything strenuous, and I usually end up refueling three times a day now."

"Like a regular mech?" Optimus said, a hint of amusement in his voice.

"Like I haven't managed to do reliably in years." Prowl said dryly, refusing to admit that his regular refueling habits weren't normal. He ran fine on two cubes of energon a day and only half the normal amount of recharge - his frame, the same as Bluestreak's and Smokescreen's, was very energy efficient. "I don't suppose I could convince you to let me do even a bit of work." Prowl said, pulling himself back to the conversation at hand.

"Unfortunately, even if I thought you were up to it, Ratchet would override me on it in this case." Optimus rumbled, a low chuckle in his voice.

"Ah. He's determined this time, then." Prowl said.

"Yes, he is." Optimus said. Silence fell for a short time. "I don't suppose ordering you not to jump in front of blasts for me would work." the Prime said, sounding weary.

"No." Prowl replied without having to think about it. "No more than it will stop Ironhide or Jazz, or any Autobot. You are our leader and we will protect you, Optimus. We don't particularly want to break in a new Prime, anyways."

"Here I thought you just didn't want the Matrix." Optimus said dryly.

"Me? With the Matrix?" Prowl actually chuckled at the thought. _"Bumblebee_would make a better Prime than I would."

"Don't sell yourself short, Prowl." Optimus said softly, suddenly serious.

"I'm not. I simply know my limitations." Prowl replied with a shrug, then pondered thoughtfully. "Actually, given some diplomatic and hand-to-hand training, Bumblebee would probably be a very good Prime, now that I think of it."

"Perhaps. Hopefully it will never come to that, however." Optimus said.

"It won't so long as you keep allowing us to protect you." Prowl said, it now being his turn to be serious.

"Alright, alright." Optimus said with a chuckle. "You win."

"I always win." Prowl said smugly.

"I hope so." Optimus said dryly. "I certainly don't want to be there when you don't. I'd rather lead the rescue party."

"I'd much rather have you on the rescue party." Prowl agreed, and Optimus chuckled, then stood.

"Come on, I'll walk you back to your quarters." the Prime said, and Prowl turned uncertainly to the table, where he'd set the guitar. "Hound said to tell you to leave it here - he'll bring the stand and datapads tomorrow."

"Very well." Prowl said as he stood, following the Prime out and back to his quarters before saying goodnight.

**- TBC -**


	4. Chapter 4

**Disclaimer:** Not mine.

**- Stairway to Heaven : Chapter Four -**

Mirage showed up at Prowl's door the next morning, saying that Hound had sent him to get Prowl while he 'kept the incompetents away from his baby', in the spy's words. Apparently the other Autobots had been curious about Hound's guitar and had tried to play it before Hound had gotten there to 'rescue' it. He was now impressing upon them the fact that none of them were allowed to touch it without his express permission.

"I believe the majority of them are listening to him mostly because they had no idea he could be so scary, to be honest." Mirage commented with amusement.

"Oh?" Prowl asked.

"Indeed. He wasn't even using his holograms to enhance the image when I left." Mirage replied with a chuckle. Prowl smiled faintly as they continued walking. Whatever commotion had been in the rec room as Hound scared the other Autobots away from his guitar was over by the time they got there, though. Hound was apparently tuning the guitar now, and Mirage led Prowl over before excusing himself to get some energon.

"Mornin' Prowl!" Hound said cheerfully as Prowl took his seat, the same one from yesterday.

"Good morning Hound." Prowl said. "I heard you had some excitement this morning."

"Ya, well, I think I underestimated the curiosity of certain mechs." Hound said with a laugh. "I made sure they knew better now, though." Prowl nodded and there was silence for a few moments as Hound tuned the guitar, only stopping and setting it down when Mirage came back with energon for all three of them.

"So how're ya liking the guitar?" Hound asked.

"It's interesting." Prowl responded. "Complex and yet simple...much easier than Cybertronian instruments."

"And yet also harder." Hound said with a laugh.

"Quite." Mirage said bitingly, and Prowl suspected the spy - who, like most Towers mechs, would have had extensive training in the arts - had attempted to play the instrument and failed miserably.

"Aw, don't feel bad 'Raj. It's a different kind of instrument, with a different purpose behind it and a different source." Hound said reassuringly. "Besides, you can't be good at everything."

"Speak for yourself." Mirage said haughtily, though from Hound's laughter, Prowl suspected the spy was joking. The two of them bantered back and forth for the next little while over their energon, often pulling Prowl in, but the tactician felt like he was intruding more than anything else - as sociable as the two mechs usually were, they'd made a point since they'd gotten together to have their morning energon together, separate from the others. They did their best to help Prowl feel included, but the tactician knew they wouldn't be back the next morning. Hound would check up on his guitar and Prowl's progress at a different time in the day.

Prowl didn't really mind, finding himself looking forward to spending the day trying to figure out the musical instrument. He barely waited for Hound and Mirage to leave before picking up where he'd left off, his almost-empty cube of energon forgotten quickly as he became absorbed in the datapads of instructions that Hound had brought him. The scout had been kind enough to organize them by skill level, so Prowl just started right in on the top one and set to work.

By mid-afternoon Prowl was playing some simple tunes, and gradually, as he played, he became aware of a steady back-and-forth between various mechs as they challenged one another to name the tune he was playing. As most of the ones he was playing now were simple and obscure human tunes, most mechs failed the challenge, but no one seemed to mind, all taking part in good fun. Prowl just smiled faintly, enjoying how he was both involved and yet separate from those in the rec room. This, he could definitely tolerate for however long it took Jazz to give in and show up.

Ironically enough, the next time Prowl encountered Jazz, it wasn't in the rec room, though. Prowl, distracted by the guitar, hadn't noticed the rec room was emptying out and had been left alone again. He knew the path between his quarters and the rec room fairly well now, so he didn't bother to comm Sideswipe - who had sworn to show up, or get someone else to show up, no matter what he was doing at the time - instead making his own way back. He was half-way back when he heard steady footsteps from around the corner, and Prowl paused at the corner, waiting for whoever it was to pass.

The mech in question stopped short at the corner, however, presumably as soon as Prowl came into view, and the tactician waited for the inevitable question as to what he was doing walking the corridors alone. When it didn't come, he frowned.

"Hello?" he asked, tilting his head to the side to express curiosity.

"Hi." even that short word was enough for Prowl to recognize Jazz's voice, and he straightened in surprise.

"Jazz." he said.

"Prowl." the saboteur replied, seeming nervous. Awkward silence fell. "So, uh, how ya been?" Prowl considered his answer for several long moments - for all he'd been trying to talk to Jazz, he'd never actually thought about what he'd say. Now, he chose quickly, but carefully.

"Confused." he said.

"What?" Jazz seemed confused himself.

"I don't exactly remember much from right before my visual center crashed." Prowl was only half-lying - he may not remember 'much', but the part he did remember was the important one. Since it was highly likely that Jazz was avoiding him because of that part, he figured it was best to just pretend he couldn't remember it. He knew Jazz had some feelings for him now, after all. He could take his time convincing the other mech he had them, as well, but only so long as Jazz wasn't avoiding him anymore.

"Oh." Jazz was obviously surprised. "I...didn't know."

"Well, you weren't at the briefing." Prowl said dryly. "So what did I say to get you mad at me?"

"Mad at -" Jazz cut his surprised statement off. "I'm not mad at you."

"So am I supposed to be mad at you, then? Because I can't think of any other reason why you'd be avoiding me." Prowl said, silently apologizing for the lie.

"No - well, unless you want to be mad at me about the crash." Jazz said. "I've just been...busy."

"Too busy to respond to my comms or the requests I passed on via Ratchet for you to come visit?" Prowl said blandly. He could practically see Jazz squirming.

"Very busy." Jazz apparently decided to stick with the flimsy lie. "I'm sorry. I'll try and stop by more often."

"Good. I've missed you." Prowl said with a small smile. Jazz didn't seem to know what to say to that. "Anyways, if you're so busy, I'd better let you go."

"Ah - yeah." Jazz said after a beat, and Prowl stepped out, carefully making his way around where he knew Jazz to be standing to the other side of the intersection, where he continued down the hall. "Hey, you need a guide back?" the awkward offer came when he was several feet away, and Prowl paused, looking back over his shoulder, though that was more habit than useful.

"If you have the time." he accepted with a nod, and he knew Jazz did when he heard the saboteur's footsteps coming closer.

"Ya, I think I got the time." he said as Prowl began walking beside him. "Though I'm kinda entertained by how you don't know your way between your quarters and the rec room by now."

"I usually let my navigation center take control." Prowl responded truthfully.

"I thought it was just your visual center that was slagged." Jazz commented.

"It is, but as Ratchet would love to tell you, there's a high degree of interconnectivity in our systems. Certain ones are integrated more fully with each other than others, to the point of being essentially useless if one of them is shut down, and my navigation and visual centers are such a case." Prowl explained. "If I wanted to form a link with the GPS system I could reroute my navigation system to go off that instead, but frankly it's not worth it."

"Ah." was Jazz's response as they kept walking. Prowl wished he could see the saboteur's face, because he suspected many interesting, and probably revealing, expressions had crossed Jazz's faceplate in the last little while. Unfortunately he was unable to see them, and settled for walking in awkward silence beside Jazz. For all that Prowl liked being alone and quiet some times, that had never applied when Jazz was nearby - it was normal, for him, to be talking with Jazz whenever the other mech was nearby, or at least listening to Jazz talk. A silent Jazz was...unnerving.

The saboteur didn't seem inclined to talk, however, murmuring a barely audible 'good night' when they reached Prowl's quarters before leaving even as Prowl returned the sentiment. Shaking his head, Prowl entered his quarters - for being a special ops mech, Jazz certainly wasn't very good at lying or pretending nothing was wrong. At least when his personal life was involved.

* * *

Whether he was keeping up the appearance of being busy or he still wasn't sure of Prowl's claims of not remembering anything, Prowl didn't know, but Jazz didn't show up in the rec room until two days later. The saboteur was quiet about it, too, sneaking in during the afternoon shift, when there were few mechs there. Those that weren't on duty were either out and about or recharging during the afternoon.

Fortunately, Bumblebee had been there, and Prowl knew of Jazz's arrival thanks to the yellow minibot calling out to his superior. Prowl raised his head, focusing on the direction of the door long enough to hear Jazz's responding 'hello' before turning back to the guitar. Jazz left several minutes later without coming over to speak with Prowl. From where he was sitting, Prowl could hear Jazz making the excuse that he had a stack of paperwork as tall as himself on his desk. Given the amount of work that regularly crossed Prowl's desk, and the fact that this was _Jazz,_who was notorious for putting paperwork off to the last minute, that was entirely believable. That didn't stop it from being annoying, though.

Another week passed with Jazz only stopping into the rec room every once and awhile, and rarely stopping to say anything to Prowl. The irritated tactician began hunting through the datapads Hound had given him for appropriately 'annoyed' songs - most of them were above his skill level, but Prowl had found that if he used the voice-interface for Teletraan to look up and listen to the songs ahead of time, he could usually do passably. Besides, he kept on with the lesson datapads...he just switched to the 'annoyed' songs whenever Jazz entered the rec room.

Unsurprisingly, the only one who didn't realize what Prowl was doing was Jazz himself. The other mechs in the Ark started out amused, but quickly grew exasperated as Jazz remained clueless. Trying to hint that Jazz should go talk to Prowl did little good - Jazz would say he didn't want to disturb Prowl, and if they pushed, he'd plead work and flee the rec room. So, they decided to try bringing Prowl to Jazz.

"You're sitting over here today." Sideswipe announced out of the blue at Prowl's side, startling the tactician, who had just entered the rec room - he'd learned his way between his quarters and the rec room by now. The red twin was now hauling Prowl off to the middle of the rec room, though, where he all but shoved Prowl into a chair. The tactician was torn between amusement and scolding the other mech, and ended up settling on a frown.

"Why?" he asked.

"Because we pushed all the tables together and moved the guitar and datapads over here." Cliffjumper said smugly from somewhere nearby.

"Again, I find myself asking - why?" Prowl asked dryly.

"We're daring Jazz to try and avoid you now." Slingshot said with a laugh.

"Yeah, he'd have to sit on the floor to get away now!" Air Raid crowed, and the conversation quickly degenerated from there into things Jazz would or would not do after Gears grumpily pointed out that it wasn't beyond the realm of possibility that Jazz would do so. Prowl just shook his head, taking the energon that was pressed into his hands, and drank it while listening as the topic morphed from Jazz to special ops to Cliffjumper's patrol the other day to various events that the mechs at the table were heading off to. It was chaotic, but Prowl clearly wasn't expected to involve himself, and no one said anything when he picked up the guitar - which had been sitting in front of him on the table - and grabbed the datapad he was currently working through. In fact, some of the conversation seemed to quiet a little, and Prowl chuckled inwardly - if only he'd known all these years that the way to get mechs in the rec room to quiet down was to play guitar near them.

Surprisingly, the other mech's plan actually worked - when Jazz came in during the evening, he had no place to go but to the central table, and everyone had been very careful to leave empty chairs next to Prowl. Jazz still tried to get as far away as he could, but two seats away was better than the entire rec room. Prowl decided to forgo the 'annoyed' music this time, instead continuing with the song he was currently learning, some human rock song. It wasn't long before Jazz commented on it.

"So how long has Prowl been playin' th' Beatles?" the saboteur asked with amusement.

"Since this morning." Prowl replied in place of whoever Jazz had been talking to, not pausing in his playing. With half of his systems shut down or at minimal functionality, it wasn't that hard for him to multi-task playing and talking to Jazz, especially since he wasn't connected to the datapad with the music at the moment - he knew the tune, he was just trying to get through it without a mistake.

"Oh. Sounds good." Jazz sounded surprised and uncomfortable at talking directly to Prowl.

"I've had time to practice." Prowl responded mildly. Jazz didn't say anything more for a few moments, and when he spoke again, he'd turned his attention to Mirage, asking what the spy thought about the new type of explosive Wheeljack had produced and if the risks of using a Wheeljack-made explosive were greater than its usefulness. Prowl let him be - it was clear Jazz still wasn't comfortable with him, so he'd try small steps.

Of course, the other mechs at the Ark had declared Jazz and Prowl's four-line conversation at the table a rousing success and decided to leave the rec room furniture the way it was. If anybody explained the sudden change in furniture arrangement to Jazz, Prowl didn't hear it, but he suspected Jazz would figure out something was up eventually, especially when the seats next to him continued to be the only ones left open. Even Ratchet and Wheeljack, coming to update Prowl on the status of his new visual center, sat to one side of him, leaving the other open. The entire Ark had evidently been recruited into the 'get Jazz to actually talk to Prowl again' plan.

Still, Jazz and Prowl's conversations remained short and awkward, mostly thanks to Jazz. Prowl was tempted to go back to his annoyed music - it had worked so well last time - but decided to be a bit more pointed this time. The mechs in the rec room were left baffled as Jazz made hasty excuses to leave, Prowl looking rather smug, after the tactician started playing _"Take My Breath Away"_. They were even more baffled when Prowl stopped the song immediately after Jazz left, and resumed the song he was practicing. Jazz actually came back later that night, having not gotten his energon the first time, and Prowl repeated the performance.

"Alright, what the slag, Prowl?" Sideswipe demanded when Jazz fled the rec room for a second time that day, this time having barely stuck it out long enough to get some energon.

"What?" Prowl asked innocently.

"Oh don't even _try._ I'm the _king_of that look, it will not work on me!" Sideswipe said with annoyance.

"I have no idea what you're talking about." Prowl replied calmly.

"Ya right." Sideswipe responded. "Why the slag did that song chase Jazz out when your others haven't?"

"I have no idea. Maybe he didn't like it?" Prowl suggested.

"A likely story." Sideswipe said with disbelief. "C'mon, Prowl! Spill!"

"Aw, leave him alone, Sides. Jazz has been weird for weeks now." Sunstreaker unexpectedly came to Prowl's rescue, though from the kick he received under the table, Prowl suspected the golden twin had figured things out. He didn't say anything, though, and neither did Prowl. Instead, he kept up with his game, making a mental bet with himself as to how long Jazz could handle being in the rec room as the tactician steadily went through every single one of the love songs on Hound's datapads, and some he acquired himself.

_"Died In Your Arms"_ had Jazz out the door barely after the first few bars were out, the saboteur claiming he'd forgotten something in his office. He managed to stay for almost all of _"Addicted to Love",_ and sat through all of _"You Give Love A Bad Name",_ but fled when Prowl continued on to _"Don't You Want Me Baby". "Love Is A Battlefield"_ had _everyone_ quieting uncomfortably, and once Jazz had fled, Sunstreaker chucked an empty energon cube at Prowl's helm. The tactician actually chuckled as it bounced off, but obligingly switched songs. Amusingly, Mirage actually managed to figure out what was up with _"Pour Some Sugar On Me",_ though Prowl and Sunstreaker claimed innocence when Hound arrived later to find the spy _still_laughing and demanded to know what had set him off.

Ironically, however, it was _"Every Breath You Take"_that finally made Jazz snap. Prowl had started in on it the instant he realized Jazz was in the rec room, as usual, but the saboteur didn't grow suddenly quiet or make his excuses and leave like he usually did. Instead, Prowl found his notes falling sour as Jazz clapped his hand over the neck of the guitar. As the sour notes faded away, so did the conversation in the rec room as mechs turned their attention to the confrontation that was apparently about to happen.

"You have a very _interestin'_repertoire, Prowl." Jazz said bitingly.

"I do, don't I?" Prowl replied mildly. "One would almost think it _meant something."_

"Yes, one would." Jazz said. "So how long've you remembered?"

"Since the second day." Prowl responded truthfully.

"An' th'decision ta mock me 'bout it came from...where?" Jazz asked in annoyance.

"The decision to _tease_ you came from the fact that you've been avoiding me without giving me a chance to explain." Prowl responded, then added as he heard the guitar creak a bit, "Hound will have your spark if you break his guitar." That seemed to remind Jazz of the other mechs in rec room, and he let go of the guitar quickly.

"I think we need t' talk." he said pointedly.

"Finally!" Sunstreaker exclaimed. Prowl couldn't see, but Sunstreaker later gave him a picture - bribed out of Red Alert - of the look Jazz gave the golden twin after that. He claimed Prowl needed it to understand why the mechs that had been in the rec room that afternoon claimed he was no longer the scariest mech around when angry. Not being able to see the venomous look, however, Prowl just set the guitar down on the table and stood, following Jazz when he headed out of the rec room. Prowl didn't bother reminding Jazz that he wasn't supposed to leave the Ark when the saboteur led him outside and up the path to the side, making their way up to a ledge on the eastern side of the dormant volcano.

"So?" Jazz said once they'd stopped.

"So what?" Prowl asked, arching an optic ridge.

"You wanted ta explain, here's yer chance, I'm here, listenin'." Jazz sounded more annoyed than receptive, despite his words. Prowl stayed silent for a few moments, trying to sort out just what he should say.

"Jazz, do you know _why_I crashed?" he asked finally.

"Sensory overload an' an aborted disconnect." Jazz responded automatically.

"And why do you think that happened?" Prowl asked. Jazz was silent for a few moments.

"Probably cuz I broke past your lock an'...surprised you." the saboteur was clearly unhappy with having to say even that much.

"Actually...no." Prowl said with a small smile. "I'm used to you breaking past my locks when you feel like it, and being unpredictable. Under other circumstances, I probably could have even handled you kissing me without crashing."

"'Other circumstances'?" Jazz asked after a moment, and Prowl hesitated a moment before continuing, both cursing and glad for the fact that he couldn't see.

"Circumstances such as me _not_having been in love with you for the past several hundred vorns." Prowl found himself tensing more and more each second that Jazz remained silent after his statement. He was going off of very little information here, after all - for all he knew, Jazz had just been...trying to cheer him up or something. Not that Jazz would be so callous, but Prowl really had no idea as to Jazz's motives at this point, and the saboteur's continued silence was unnerving.

In the end, Jazz didn't bother speaking, instead stepping up to Prowl, and the tactician found himself being kissed again. This time, without the impending systems crash, Prowl was able to enjoy it, and respond, wrapping his arms around the other black and white to pull him closer. When they finally broke away, Jazz laughed lightly.

"Primus, aren't we a pair!" he said, resting his forehead against Prowl's. "I wanted ta jump you from th'moment we met. A few vorns down th'road I realized that I'd gone an' fallen for ya." Prowl smirked as he recalled that Optimus had actually had order them both to his office to get them to meet - they'd been so busy helping keep the Autobots together back then, that meeting their fellow officers hadn't been much of a priority. Optimus had disagreed.

"You wanted to jump me in front of Optimus?" he asked.

"Well I figured he could leave if he wanted." Jazz replied with a snicker, and Prowl chuckled, his grip on Jazz tightening when the saboteur lifted his head. He wasn't ready to let go of Jazz yet. Fortunately, Jazz didn't even try to move away, apparently quite happy where he was. "So I'm guessin' this is why Raj burst inta laughter."

"I haven't actually asked him, but I'm fairly sure he figured it out then." Prowl confirmed.

"Mmm." Jazz murmured. "So where we goin' from here?"

"Back inside before Ratchet finds out I'm up here?" Prowl suggested, and Jazz smacked his chassis with one hand.

"Smartaft." the saboteur accused.

_"Your_smartaft." Prowl corrected pleasantly, then sobered. "We go wherever we feel like, Jazz."

"Can we do that? I mean, considerin' our positions." Jazz asked curiously.

"I could comm Optimus and ask if you like, but I suspect he'd just tell us not to bother him with stupid questions." Prowl said dryly. "Ironhide and Chromia thoroughly beat any objection to officers having relationships into the ground a long, long time ago back on Cybertron."

"Heh. Yeah, they did, didn't they?" Jazz said with a snicker. "Well, there goes my last objection!"

"You had objections to start with?" Prowl asked incredulously.

"Well, ok, more like reasons to stop myself from jumping you. Which means now I'm free to act on my impulses." Jazz was clearly leering as he spoke, and finished up with a sloppy kiss that had Prowl actually pushing him away, chucking. He was about to respond when his comm suddenly came to life.

_"Prowl...where are you?"_the dangerous tone in Ratchet's voice was unmistakable, and Prowl considered his response for a few moments as he quietly pulled Jazz into the comm link.

_"Defiling a storage closet with Jazz."_he finally responded, and in front of him, Jazz snorted with laughter.

_"I had no idea we had storage closets_ outside _the Ark where I_ clearly _told you _not to go_."_Ratchet responded without missing a beat.

_"My fault, Ratch', I'll bring him back in."_Jazz piped up with a chuckle.

_"You'd better, or I'm coming out there with my wrench and bringing you_ both _in. The hard way."_Ratchet said threateningly.

_"Yessir!"_Jazz said laughingly, and backed out of the comm link.

_"We're heading down now."_ Prowl assured Ratchet as Jazz took his hand and pulled him down the path, back to the Ark entrance. Ratchet was actually waiting for them at the entrance, but headed off with a simple "And _stay_inside!" before Jazz could get any sort of witty remark out. The saboteur was probably disappointed a bit at that, but didn't say anything, instead pulling Prowl along the corridors until, to the tactician's surprise, they were back at the rec room.

"I badly need some energon." Jazz said by way of explanation. "I haven't exactly had many opportunities for - hey! Did you guys seriously rearrange th' rec room just ta get me ta talk ta him?" the last part was called out indignantly as they entered the rec room, and Prowl realized the noise of talking mechs was spread out again - the tables and chairs had evidently been returned to their previous positions.

"Yep!" several mechs chorused, and Prowl smirked as Jazz huffed indifferently.

"I thought you said Raj only figured it out when you were playin' _Pour Some Sugar On Me?"_Jazz asked grouchily as he pulled Prowl through the rec room to the energon dispenser.

"One doesn't need to know the details to be concerned that two officers that are usually very good friends suddenly aren't talking to one another." Prowl responded easily.

"And since it wasn't detrimental to your plans, you just went along with it?" Jazz guessed, chuckling.

"Indeed." Prowl said pleasantly as Jazz got some energon before pulling him towards the door again. At the threshold, however, Jazz paused and looked back.

"Y'all are a bunch of nosey layabouts!" he called out, then before the objections started, amended in a more cheerful tone, "Thanks!" and he hauled Prowl out of the rec room to laughter.

**- TBC -**


	5. Chapter 5

**Disclaimer:** Not mine.

**- Stairway to Heaven : Chapter Five -**

"I think yer abusin' th'fact that y'can't see." Jazz mumbled, though he made no move towards getting out of Prowl's lap, even with the many suggestions from mechs around them to 'get a room'. Though, after several weeks of these displays, there were far fewer of those suggestions than there had been at first.

"I _can _still hear." Prowl responded lightly, pulling away from the kiss he'd engaged Jazz in as soon as the saboteur's undignified squawk at being pulled down had let him locate Jazz's mouth.

"So what, yer sayin' you just don't care that they're there?" Jazz asked with amusement as he finally squirmed his way out of Prowl's lap, allowing the tactician to pick up Hound's guitar and resume the song he'd been practicing. Prowl had been prepared to give the instrument back to Hound now that things were finally settled, but the scout had insisted that he would still need something to do, and it would be a shame to waste everything he'd already learned. So Prowl still spent his days in the rec room practicing, only now that practice was interrupted when Jazz came in to visit. And occasionally, Prowl would get Sideswipe to sneak him past Ratchet and into Jazz's office, where he'd play for the saboteur while he worked.

"Not particularly." Prowl responded. "They've had enough time to get used to it, they should know to look away or leave if they don't want to see it."

"Y'know, I never woulda pegged ya as a mech that was fond'a PDAs." Jazz said with a laugh.

"By the time you met me, I hadn't been in a relationship for several vorns, and afterwards I didn't have _time,_so I can't blame you." Prowl replied. There was a short silence, during which Prowl suspected he was getting a highly suspicious look from Jazz.

"Why do I get th'feelin' that there's another reason that 'Hide tells us to get a room?" the saboteur asked, and sure enough, he sounded rather suspicious.

"Oh no, he has the same reasons." Prowl replied amiably. The unspoken 'but there's someone else who doesn't' hung there challengingly, and there was another long silence from Jazz.

"Ratchet?" the saboteur guessed.

"No, though he's heard tales." Prowl responded, now smiling faintly. There was a reason, after all, that Ratchet hadn't paused when presented with Prowl's _'defiling a storage closet with Jazz'_comment.

"Uhm...Trailbreaker?" Jazz was clearly trying to dredge up Autobots that had already been in Prime's unit when he'd transferred in as the new head of Special Ops.

"No." Prowl's smile was wider now.

"I give, who?" Jazz asked.

"I'll give you a hint. Ever heard of regulation 47-delta?" Prowl asked.

"Can't say that I have." Jazz replied after a moment's thought. Prowl was about to explain it to him when a sound caught his audios, and with a smirk, he looked up towards where he knew the door was. He was aware that he was currently, and was going to continue to, completely ruin his stoic officer image, but he was in an extremely good mood for the first time in many vorns, and it had been far too long since he'd tormented the approaching mech about this particular subject. And said mech needed a little tormenting every once and awhile. So Prowl smirked and waited as the approaching mech's footsteps entered the rec room, holding off for just another few seconds to be sure his target was actually coming inside before speaking up, raising his voice to be heard across the rec room.

"Optimus, Jazz was wondering what regulation 47-delta was. Care to tell him?" the tactician called out. A strange stillness fell over the rec room, the only sound being Prowl plucking at the guitar, playing a cheery tune.

"I _was_coming to tell you that Ratchet wants you in med bay, but I think I'll just leave now." Optimus sounded pained, and beside Prowl, Jazz made a choking sound.

_"Optimus?"_he hissed.

"Why, what's regulation 47-delta?" Sideswipe piped up, and Prowl actually smiled, ever grateful for the red twin's never-ending curiosity about things that made officers squirm.

"Regulation 47-delta states that Prowl is never, under any circumstance, to be allowed in my office while I am not there and he is in the company of someone with whom he is currently engaged in a personal relationship with." Optimus intoned. Prowl smirked, strumming a triumphant chord on the guitar, and around the rec room there was a deathly silence as everyone computed just what that meant.

It was broken a few moments later by Jazz collapsing into hysterical giggles. With the moment over, the other mech's reactions were released, ranging from cursing at the mental images, laughing like Jazz, or outright applauding Prowl. Prowl just nodded in acknowledgement of the praise, and ignored the others, as he reached over to set Hound's guitar on its stand. A light vibration in the floor alerted him to Optimus' approach, and he made a point of wrapping his arm around Jazz's shoulders and tugging the saboteur close, making Jazz - and a few other mechs - start snickering.

"You know I'm happy that the two of you have finally resolved this situation, Prowl, but I had sincerely hoped your..._exhibitionist_tendencies had been curbed over the vorns." the Autobot leader said pointedly.

"Considering I haven't traumatized anyone yet, you in particular, I'd say they _have_been curbed." Prowl responded innocently. "But then, I can't exactly see anyone's reactions at the moment, so it's not quite as entertaining."

"I'm going to need to amend 47-delta, aren't I?" Optimus asked with a sigh.

"Probably." Jazz spoke up, still snickering, from where he was tucked against Prowl's side. "I mean, I don't have much shame in th'first place, an' if these stories I'm suddenly hearin' 'bout Prowler are true..."

"Oh believe me, they are." Optimus said. "And I suspect you'll see the truth of them soon. Wheeljack and Ratchet have completed your new visual center, Prowl." The tactician straightened in surprise.

"Several weeks early." he commented.

"Mmm, the mission to Cybertron for supplies was more of a success than anticipated - Wheeljack was able to find several components already constructed, from what I understand." Optimus responded. "They're getting set up in the med bay now."

"Then I'd better get going." Prowl said, letting go of Jazz and pushing himself up from the chair.

"I'll walk you." Optimus offered, then added pointedly. "Jazz's break is over shortly, anyways, as I recall."

"Soon, but I'm sure I can make th'time t'walk Prowl to med bay." Jazz said, sounding surprised.

"Just so long as you remember that Ratchet has very large wrenches, very good aim, and very _little_tolerance." Optimus responded lightly as he began to walk, Prowl following automatically, and Jazz taking only a few moments to catch up as he realized what Optimus was implying.

"The _med bay?_" Jazz squeaked, the incredulous question clearly aimed at Prowl.

"I was seeing a medic at the time." Prowl replied casually, remembering some of the _interesting_uses he and his partner had come up with for berth restraints before Optimus had caught them and ordered them - well, just Prowl - out of the med bay. It wasn't like there had been anyone in there, anyways - there'd been no patients, and his partner was the on-call medic that night.

"Yes, and unfortunately I learned more than I wanted to about _her,_too." Optimus said with a shake of his head. "I never thought I'd say this, but Jazz, if you could keep Prowl in check, I would be forever in your debt."

"Uhm...we'll see." Jazz said after a moment, and Prowl suspected the saboteur was trying to figure out if having Optimus owe him one was worth more than finding unique interfacing spots with Prowl. A few moments later, Jazz pinged Prowl's comm system, and the tactician obligingly opened a line.

_"So would this be why y'were more amused than shocked that I wanted t'jump ya when we met?" _Jazz asked.

_"Well it certainly would have been a new experience for him to be there from the beginning."_Prowl replied blandly, and Jazz snickered again. Walking slightly ahead of then, Optimus sighed.

"Why can't my subordinates just be plotting to overthrow me, and not cause permanent psychological trauma?" he asked rhetorically. The two officers behind him remained silent, save for the occasional snicker that escaped Jazz, as they walked the rest of the way to the med bay.

* * *

"Alright, load it up _slowly,_Prowl." Ratchet instructed, and Prowl obligingly activated his newly-installed visual center, taking his time in loading the subroutines for the new hardware into his CPU and allowing them to adapt and slip into old pathways. Ratchet apparently approved, as he didn't comment, just letting Prowl go through the process carefully. Finally, the entirely system was reading as loaded, giving him a 'ready for activation' signal. Prowl put that off for a moment as he reactivated the sensors he'd turned off, and then there was another short period of adjustment as he allowed his visual center to adjust to the new systems.

"I know you haven't locked up on me there, Prowl." Ratchet said crankily as Prowl stopped there, hesitating. At the imperative knock on his helm from the medic, Prowl grimaced and activated his battle computer. As expected, it sent him onto his back on the berth as it began to sync with his memory banks, playing catch-up in order to present viable plans. And, in what Prowl was convinced was evidence of the vindictive streak he was sure his battle-computer came preprogrammed with, it also helpfully formulated plans for the memories it had been offline for. It was hard-coded into the battle-computer to do so, in order for it, and Prowl, to learn from past mistakes, but it was...irritating. Especially now, when it presented him with no less than six different courses of action that would have had the situation between him and Jazz resolved inside of a day. Then suddenly Prowl wasn't cursing out his battle computer, but was recognizing 'it's' plans as his own, and acknowledging his sloppy, if effective, handling of the situation.

And so, finally, _finally,_with one last diagnostic to make sure that his visual center was correctly synced with all the necessary systems, Prowl activated it, and shortly after, turned his new optics on.

"Why hallo thar!" Jazz purred from right in front of his face, completely blocking his vision, and Prowl sighed.

"Jazz, as wonderful as it is to see your faceplate first thing, please move." he said. Jazz, grinning, obligingly drew back, revealing the med bay and a watching Ratchet and Wheeljack. Optimus had left some time ago with Jazz, when Ratchet and Wheeljack had started installing Prowl's visual center, and when they'd finished, only Jazz had returned, Optimus being engaged in a teleconference with the humans.

"How's everything look?" Ratchet asked as Prowl looked around.

"Have the walls always been so...orange?" the tactician asked after a moment, and Wheeljack laughed.

"You should know, you picked the colour." Ratchet said dryly.

"You're kidding me! _Prowl _is the slagger we have to thank for that?" Jazz yelped.

"It's the natural colour of the alloy the ship is made of - the alloy which, I might remind you all, is what has allowed the Ark to survive so long with so little damage." Prowl responded. "I just don't recall it being so..._orange."_

"Hmm. Could be something's off with your colour perception. Try focusing on other colours, tell me if they seem off." Ratchet said, and Prowl obligingly sought out different colours - mostly using the paint jobs of the three mechs present - but the colouring seemed normal to him. Only the Ark seemed unusually vibrant to his optics.

"It doesn't seem like anything's wrong. I suspect you're just noticing it now because you haven't seen it in so long. I'm sure if you give yourself a few days to get used to it you won't notice it as much." Ratchet finally concluded.

"If you say so." Prowl said dubiously as he swung his legs off the side of the berth.

"I do." Ratchet said. "I take it there are no other anomalies? No errors in your CPU?"

"None so far." Prowl agreed.

"Good. I want you back here tomorrow, and then a week after that, just to make sure everything's still going alright, but until then - get out of my med bay." Ratchet said brightly.

"Eh, Ratch, aren't you forgetting something?" Wheeljack asked with amusement, and Ratchet straightened suddenly.

"Oh, right!" the medic said, then turned and reached behind a machine on the nearby berth that he and Wheeljack had used while installing Prowl's visual center. What he produced from behind said machine was a charred lump of slag. "Here, souvenir." Ratchet declared, dumping it into Prowl's lap.

"What is it?" Prowl asked after a moment of staring.

"Your old visual center. I told you you'd slagged it good and proper." Ratchet replied with a snort.

"Evidently." Prowl said, picking up the charred lump and turning it from side-to-side. "Why is my CPU not melted down?"

"Because I'm just that good." Ratchet responded smugly, but the expression only lasted a few moments before shifting into an irritated one. "Of course, I wouldn't _have_ to be that good if certain mechs didn't keep making my job _harder..."_

"Aw, c'mon Ratch, without th' Academy 'round t'keep ya on yer toes, how else are ya gonna learn an' expand yer skills?" Jazz asked cheerfully.

"By research. Safe, painless research that does not risk the lives of anything but _simulated_mechs." Ratchet said bitingly, then swept the both of them with a glare. "Now, didn't I tell you two to get out already?"

"Of course." Prowl said, standing from the berth, still holding his old, melted visual center as he nodded to Ratchet. "Thank you again for your excellent services."

"Yeah yeah, get out of here." Ratchet grumbled, turning his back to them and starting to clean up. Wheeljack gave them an amused look and started helping the medic, while Prowl and Jazz took the hint and left.

"We should get a stand for it." Jazz commented as they walked down the corridor, heading naturally in the direction of the rec room, where they'd spent so much time recently.

"Why?" Prowl asked in amusement.

"Well, in a way, it _is_responsible for us gettin' together. Kinda deserves t'be commemorated for that, don'tcha think?" Jazz responded.

"Hmm." Prowl replied thoughtfully, and was immensely please as his battle computer presented him with several alternate uses, several of which he quite liked. "I think such a significant piece of slag deserves better than being a paperweight or to be put on display, actually."

"Oh, what did you have in mind?" Jazz asked.

"I'm debating between using it as ammunition against the Decepticons - though I doubt they'd appreciate it properly - or leaving it in..._specific_spots around the Ark for other mechs to find and bring back to me while I wait to see how long it takes them to figure out why I left it there." Prowl replied.

"And why _would_ya be leaving it there?" Jazz asked curiously. Prowl looked over at Jazz and arched an optic ridge at him.

"Why do _you_think?" he asked, and Jazz frowned for a moment before he realized, suddenly grinning and looping an arm through Prowl's.

"Prowler, love, I like th'way ya think." the saboteur purred. "Where were ya thinkin'a leavin' it first?"

"I'm not quite sure. The possibilities are endless." Prowl said thoughtfully. "However, considering that Optimus has been fore-warned, it is probably best to move quickly."

"True, true." Jazz said, then suddenly tugged Prowl off to the side, through an open doorway, and Prowl looked around in surprise before smiling.

"Perfect!" he said.

"Man, 'Hide has about half the datapads I do, th'slacker!" Jazz complained as he surveyed the desk in the room. Then, cheerfully, he hauled Prowl over to said desk and carefully moved the datapads off to the side before hopping up on the surface and waggling his eyebrows at Prowl. The tactician smiled, and casually tossed his slagged visual center so it landed on Ironhide's chair before stepping in close to his new lover for a kiss...and a fair bit more.

* * *

Much later, they finally made their way to the rec room, and Prowl suspected that it was only thanks to their relaxed, happy looks and the suspicious gap of time between them leaving med bay and their arrival in the rec room that they weren't immediately pounced on by the mechs in the room. Hound in particular had looked ready to call out to Prowl, but apparently thought better of it as the tactician followed Jazz to the energon dispenser. Getting their energon, Jazz started heading towards the corner where Hound's guitar was still sitting, but Prowl made in a different direction.

He was amused how the same suspicious quiet from weeks earlier fell over the rec room again as mechs noticed where he was going. Jazz seemed to be watching warily as Prowl approached his target, the saboteur following, but carefully stopping out of arms reach. Prowl shook his head at the reactions of the other mechs as he turned his optics to the chess board. No one was using it at the moment, so Prowl was able to inspect it carefully.

The original chessboard had been a simple thing - steel, with squares etched into the surface, and simple over-sized plastic pieces that a small human company had made at Prowl's request. The new chessboard, however, was a bit more...elaborate. It was still metal, but from the looks of things, Jazz had somehow gotten the base made out of titanium, and had gotten matching chairs - from their design and details, Prowl suspected Mirage might have done some salvaging in the Towers ruins on his last trip back to Cybertron. The board itself, however, was obviously from earth. Black and white stones were used to make the squares, and Prowl wasn't quite sure how they managed it, but faintly seen in each of the white squares, seemingly embedded in the stone itself, was an Autobot symbol. Reaching out and touching the squares lightly, Prowl gave Jazz a questioning look.

"Obsidian an' opal." the saboteur supplied, and Prowl nodded before turning his attention to the pieces. Picking up a black pawn, he saw it wasn't made of the same stone as the squares, but a dark-coloured metal. Glancing over at the white pieces, he saw they were the same - metallic, but white in color. Then his optics caught on the king and queen of the white side, and he couldn't help but grin faintly - Optimus and Elita stood in place of the traditional pieces, striking heroic poses. Putting down the black pawn, he glanced over at the black king and queen, and couldn't help a snort of laughter at the silly-looking Megatron and Starscream.

"I was debatin' over redoing all th'pieces, but I figured this was better. There's a regular king an' queen for each side, too." Jazz put in.

"It's wonderful. Thank you." Prowl said finally, turning to the saboteur and smiling faintly. A collective 'awww' from behind Prowl reminded him that he and Jazz weren't alone, and he turned and gave them all an appraising look, many of them quickly pretending that they hadn't been watching.

"There _will_ be a regulation against messing with _this_chessboard." he said pointedly to them all, and there were a few chuckles before normal chatter began to resume. Prowl left them to it as he seated himself at the chessboard, on the white side. There was a healthy edging of titanium tabletop around the board itself, leaving room for captured pieces and energon cubes, and Prowl set his cube down and looked up at Jazz.

"Care for a game?" he asked, and Jazz grinned as he took the opposite chair.

"I'm glad ya like it." Jazz said as Prowl began studying the board, deciding what move he wanted to open with.

"I can't see why you thought I wouldn't." Prowl remarked.

"Well, th'old one was plain, but I dunno, it might've had some sentimental value to ya." Jazz said with a shrug.

"Besides being my first chessboard? Not really." Prowl replied as he moved his first piece. "Where did you put it, anyways?"

"Didn't put it anywhere. 'Jack made off with it, sayin' somethin' 'bout gettin' Ratch ta relax even if he couldn't get him ta leave." Jazz said with a chuckle as he began scanning the board, recalculating his first move in light of Prowl's. "Didn't figure out what he meant for a few days 'til I visited Ratch's office, though - 'Jack took the base off so it's more mobile now, an' made a box for the pieces."

"It's good that it's still being used." Prowl commented. "I take it switching them was your project while I was in the med bay?" Jazz didn't respond for several long moments, seemingly studying the board, and Prowl frowned faintly.

"It was my project while Ratch' was still tryin' ta figure out if he could save ya or not." the saboteur said quietly. Knowing that both chessboards had been bolted down, and how long it would have taken to switch them out, Prowl frowned. He tried to come up with something to say, but Jazz unexpectedly kept speaking. "You were in critical condition for almost 24 hours, didja know? Ratch didn't recharge - Jack only left to come down here fer energon fer th'two'a them. One'a those times happened ta be when I'd just uprooted th'old board. I think he was feelin' a little sentimental 'bout it, considerin' your chances were still 50/50." Jazz fell silent for a moment, and Prowl struggled to find something appropriate to say - an apology, or something, anything. He found himself as a loss, however, so instead he reached over and slipped his hand around Jazz's, gripping tightly. Jazz returned the grip with more force, and finally looked up from the chessboard.

"Took me 15 hours t'install this thing t'my satisfaction." the saboteur said, looking at Prowl intently. "Spent th'rest of th'time pretendin t'do paperwork in m'office, pretendin' I wasn't terrified that you were never gonna see the new board. When Ratch finally got ya stabilized...well, those were prob'ly the best words I've ever heard him say. Certainly made my day. Then I got t'read th'report. I don't think even Prime realized until then just how close it'd been. Every mech knows cranial damage is bad, an' you had that and damage around yer spark. It wasn't...wasn't an easy read. Only reason I made it through it was cuz I knew ya were gonna be ok.

"Then...Ratch letcha go, deemed ya well enough t'leave med bay...but there were still things wrong with ya that he hadn't managed t'fix. It threw me." Jazz said, his voice dropping to a near whisper as he looked back at the chessboard. "I mean, I know Ratch has let mechs out of med bay before - includin' you an' I - when he couldn't fix somethin' right away an' they were able t'move around. But...it was different this time for some reason. Dunno why. Maybe it was just one time too many - the last straw, t'use human terms." Jazz smiled faintly for a moment before it disappeared again, and he looked up at Prowl. "Decided I'd finally make m'move. We both know how that turned out." Jazz's smile was self-depreciating. "Felt a little bit guilty after that, which was why I was avoidin' ya. Figured I didn't have a right t'bring it up again after I sent ya back inta critical care th'first time."

"Your thought pathways are very, very strange sometimes." Prowl said with a slight shake of his head, and Jazz grinned slightly.

"Well, we can't all be neat, logical mechs like you." the saboteur said.

"No, some of you have to be lovable idiots." Prowl said. "While you had a part in my second crash, you were not at fault for it, Jazz. You were just the...last straw." Prowl smiled as he used Jazz's human phrase. "It was a precarious situation that Ratchet and I had gotten myself into, something we never should have done...and you had incredibly bad timing."

"Tell me 'bout it." Jazz said with a snort.

"I don't exactly remember much of it, sorry." Prowl said with a faint grin.

"Liar." Jazz accused, using his free hand to poke Prowl in the forehead.

"I'm not lying." Prowl said with a chuckle. "The only thing I remember clearly from the crash is you kissing me." Jazz stared at him in surprise.

"Seriously?" the saboteur asked in disbelief.

"Entirely." Prowl said with a nod. "Actually, the crash was mostly my fault for ignoring everything else and trying to just enjoy the moment. I probably could have avoided the crash entirely if my thought processes hadn't turned to organic mush the instant I realized what was going on."

"Wait...so...you're saying you caused your own crash...because I distracted you too well by kissing you?" Jazz asked, frowning.

"Essentially." Prowl replied, nodding, and the saboteur just stared at him for a few moments before starting to chuckle.

"Prowl, love, I don't think ya know what y'just admitted." the saboteur said, a mischievous gleam in his optics. Apparently the saboteur had decided having Optimus owe him one wasn't quite worth it.

"Or I do know and am entirely fine with it." Prowl replied, a smirk forming. "You do recall where we 'accidentally' left my old visual center just a short while ago, don't you?" Jazz sniggered some more, and Prowl tolerated it for a few moments before tugging on the hand of Jazz's that he still held. "It's still your turn, you know. Are you going to move, or forfeit?" Jazz, still snickering, eyed the board for a few moments before making his move. Prowl, having anticipated that move, countered right away, and then the game was off.

They managed to finish that game, and were half-way into another before Ironhide showed up, looking perplexed as he returned Prowl's old visual center to him. The older mech seemed rightly wary of the matching grins on the two black-and-white's faceplates, and fled without asking how the lump of slag had managed to get into his office.

Shortly after that, Prowl and Jazz left to find a new place to 'accidentally' leave it.

**- THE END -**


End file.
